MkLinux&mdash;Linux Comes to the Power Macintosh

Macintosh users can now come in from the cold—MkLinux has arrived. Here's how it happened, and how you can get it.

Your Mileage May Vary

Despite being distributed by Prime Time Freeware, MkLinux is
not yet ready for prime time. As already noted, many people have
had problems right from the start, being unable to even boot from
their drives. Sources at Apple say this problem will be solved by
the time you read this article, but if you're considering
purchasing a new drive, you will want to check whether the one
you're considering has been used successfully by someone else
before spending money on it.

Video support in the first Developer's Release is a bit
sparse. Only on-board video and the HPV card are supported, and
this has caused some problems with people who have “AV” Macintosh
systems.

Floppy drives and, more unfortunately, serial output, are not
supported with this first release. Thus, while you can play around
with networking if you have access to Ethernet, those of us who
connect to the Internet via PPP will have to wait a bit. The lack
of serial support also limits printing options.

On the SCSI bus, only hard drives and CD-ROMs are supported
at the moment. The release notes say other devices, such as the
Iomega ZIP drive, have not been tested, but I have not gotten mine
to work, and I know of no one on the Internet who has.

Finally, as with any developer's release, your mileage may
vary with respect to getting various programs and systems working.
For example, while I have not gotten Emacs to work, I know of
several people who've had no problem with it. On the other hand,
Apple's own Errata, as of May 25, mentions a problem regarding a
shell script that will cause you to be logged out the first time
you log on as root; I have never encountered this problem.

However, the MkLinux teams at Apple and OSF got a lot of
things right. The installation procedure (assuming you have a
MkLinux-friendly drive) is one of the smoothest installations I've
ever been through for a software package of this size. Considering
this is a developer's release, it has been remarkably stable. While
there have been some surprises, usually either some work-around has
been developed or the situation is put right on the “to-do” list
by the Apple/OSF teams.

MkLinux's Future Shines Bright

According to Michael Burg at Apple, MkLinux will go through
at least one more developer's release, scheduled near the end of
the summer, before the Reference Release is distributed in
September. The MkLinux world has proven that it moves as quickly as
the Intel Linux world, with updates and patches appearing on
Apple's FTP site ftp://ftp.mklinux.apple.com/pub/) on a weekly
basis. According to a schedule that Michael Burg released to the
Internet in early June, most of the bugs and omissions from
DR1—such as video console and driver issues, SCSI driver bugs, and
the lack of serial support—should be solved and implemented by
the time you read this article. PCI bus support is scheduled for
the Reference Release with support for the PPC 603e platforms
coming some time in autumn.

After autumn, what's next? To a large extent, like any Linux,
that depends on us. Apple and the OSF have released the full source
code for this project to anyone who wants it, respecting the spirit
that has guided Linux since Linus Torvalds first released it. Some
Intel Linux hackers have wondered whether there is enough of a
critical mass of MkLinux programmers to keep the project alive.
Based on the beginnings of the community that has come alive around
this first developer's release, I don't think we'll disappoint our
Intel brethren.

The Macintosh is a computer which, through its eleven years
of life, has inspired a lot of love and dedication. With MkLinux,
we have the opportunity, as the saying goes, to “fall in love all
over again.”

Richard Kinne
(kinnerc@snymorva.cs.snymor.edu)
is using the MkLinux project to
re-acquaint himself with the Unix operating system after having
been exiled to VAX/VMS-land for ten years. He works as the User
Services Consultant for the State University of New York at
Morrisville. When not writing or hacking with his significant
other, he enjoys Star Trek, Babylon
5 and playing with his cats.

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